Celebrating 40 Years Of Service
Women For Wheels South Australia Inc
Where: Tea Tree Gully Golf Club, Fairview Park SA 5126
When: Saturday The 27th Of August From 7pm Until Midnight
A Brief History
Women for Wheels of SA Inc is a voluntary, non profit organisation providing Fire and Rescue expertise to Motorsport, administrated and crewed by members who have a love for Motorsport.
Women for Wheels was founded back in 1971 by a group of women whose husbands, boy friends and friends competed in motorsport of some form.
These women soon realised that the area of fire and rescue coverage at these events was limited to an individual who on the day was given the task as a fire marshal, by the simple question do you know what a fire extinguisher is? Good you can be a fire marshal today.
Seeing this was not the ideal scenario, the wives and girlfriends formed a committee to raise funds to put together an organisation that provided Fire and Rescue expertise to circuit racing.
Organisers, sponsors and competitors donated goods to be raffled as prizes, including a major prize of a Formula Vee Open Wheeler race car and trailer, raising early funds.
With these funds and the help of a great band of volunteers the first fire unit was commissioned for service with the unit being crewed by volunteers with an interest in motorsport and coming from back grounds in the MFS, CFS and Theatre Firemen.
In the early days the events covered were mainly the Old Rowley Park Speedway and Adelaide International Raceway for circuit racing.
The committee was made up of the wives and girlfriends filling the committee places with one of the first members of the crew filling the fire chiefs role.
The Fire Chief’s responsibilities were related to organising fire crew to cover race meetings and the well being of crew members, the committee ran the administrative role of the club.
As the existence of the club grew over the years, more and more organisations associated with motorsport were wishing to use our services, and so our expertise expanded to not only circuit racing and speedway but drag racing as well.
With the Government of SA at the time winning the rights to hold the Formula 1 Grand Prix in Adelaide, this put Motorsport in Australia on the International stage.
The organisers were looking for a group to manage the fire and rescue component of such a large event, so they turned to the then Fire Chief to see if he wished to be the first fire chief of this event.
With the support of the Women for Wheels committee and it’s active fire crew and members, this first year was organised and expertise provided to this event and to the following 10 years when it was held in Adelaide.
With the spotlight put on Australian Motorsport, the club saw in it’s wisdom that the way to go was ahead and in the next few years worked towards upgrading the original fire unit to present day standards, this included also upgrading the safety apparel worn by our members to afford them with better protection against the elements and in their duties working at race meetings.
As the club grew and with more of the fire crew becoming involved with club goings ons, the constitution was changed to allow any member of the club to be elected to fill roles on the committee.
The varied expertise outside of the club of members, enabled the club to capitalise on this expertise and with this our reputation of covering motor sport events expanded to include Off Road, Rally and Lake Gardiner speed events carried out by American Motorsport enthusiasts, to events held at the Wayville Show Grounds and the Entertainment Centre.
This led us to the mid 1990′s when it was found that the number of race meetings was increasing to such an extent that a second unit was commissioned to cover these events.
In one year the crew covered over one hundred and forty race days.
With the club now owning two purpose built fire units we were able to improve our race coverage and equipped them with the latest Rescue Tools, moving away from the hand operated original equipment.
V8 Supercars coming to the streets of Adelaide in as we call it now the CLIPSAL 500, Women for Wheels was again called upon to organise the Fire and Rescue side of the event to the extent of the Fire Chief, Deputy Fire Chief and the Emergency Controller, with it’s experienced fire crew occupying areas requiring their expertise to booster the hundreds of fire marshals that cover the event each year.
These days our active Fire Marshals consist of both genders of the population including the younger members assisting in administrative roles until they become of age to be able to work trackside.
Meetings that have or have used our services include, Clipsal 500, LeMan’s, Mallala Motorsport Park, Speedway City, North Arm Boat Racing, Classic Adelaide Rally, Rally of SA, Adelaide International Raceway, Wayville Extreme events and the V8 Supercar event in Darwin NT to name just a few.
Monies raised to outfit the crew in their uniforms, buy and maintain vehicles and provide social functions for club members have always been provided by the voluntary expertise’s and commitment of it’s members to provide the best possible Fire and Rescue service to Motorsport as humanly possible.
Through out the life of the club all positions held in the club and at race meetings have been provided on a voluntary basis with all monies raised being placed back into the running of the club for it’s members.
Written by the Secretary of Women for Wheels of SA Inc.
Robin Smith
Active Fire Marshal And Life Member
Celebrating 40 Years Of Service
